Summary

Metal theft is common and costly. It
refers to incidents in which items are stolen for the value of their
constituent metals. Such items vary enormously, from air conditioning units
being stolen for their copper tubing to the theft of catalytic converters for
their palladium, radium and aluminium. The absence of a specific metal theft
crime category limits the confidence we can place in estimates on the extent of
the problem. Nonetheless, regional, national and international figures suggest
large increases in the volume of metal theft over the past decade, largely
attributed to steep increases in the price of many metals.

Metal theft is a clear illustration of how societal changes can generate
opportunities for crime: increased (global) demand for metals and associated
price increases tilt a traditionally undesirable crime target to desirable. It
is important to consider that the same may also apply to other commodities that
are not traditionally stolen, but which are susceptible to price increases.

PLACE: The widespread use of metals means
that opportunities for metal theft are vast. Theft tends to concentrates at
places where opportunities are plentiful and where guardianship is low, so
reducing the risk of an offender being detected. Common locations include
railway lines, churches and construction sites. Research in the US suggests
that levels of metal theft are higher in cities that have a greater rate of
scrap metal outlets.

OFFENDER: Metal thieves can be thought of as
occupying two groups. The first are those that steal metal-bearing items. These
include opportunists who exploit easily removable items to make a profit, as
well more organized groups equipped to steal metal on a grander scale and with
a working knowledge of the scrap metal industry. The second group concerns
those that trade in stolen metals. These individuals might be complicit in the
crime or purchase metals unknowingly. ‘Insiders’ who are working in or are
familiar with industries where metals are common can populate either group.

TARGET: Metal theft takes many forms,
reflecting the numerous applications for which metals are used. Common targets
include beer kegs, manhole covers, catalytic converters, air conditioning
units, copper wiring and cabling, lead from roofs and bronze plaques and
statues. Most have experienced rapid price surges in recent years.

IMPLEMENTING
RESPONSES: Despite a flurry of activity designed to reduce metal theft, robust
evaluations of implemented measures are rare. Evidence to inform the selection
of suitable strategies is therefore lacking. Measures that have been put in
place tend to concentrate on increasing the difficulty in stealing metals and
increasing the risks associated with disposing of them. This is against a
backdrop of repeated calls to alter out-dated UK legislation in ways that
thwart the illegal trade in metals.

Crime Overview

DEFINITION: Metal theft refers to the illegal
removal of items for their constituent metals. It can take numerous forms, from
the theft of copper railway cabling to the theft of lead from church roofs.
Unlike other items targeted in thefts, stolen metals have little inherent value
to the metal thief; profit is only generated upon sale. For this reason, it is
assumed that many items are stolen with the intention of being sold to scrap
metal merchants.

Research on metal theft is limited,
particularly reliable evaluations of efforts to reduce metal theft (or specific
types of metal theft). This absence is partly explained by the difficulty in
accessing metal theft data from police recorded crime statistics. In England
and Wales there is no metal theft offence category; the theft of metal-bearing
items can therefore be recorded under several crime categories (typically ‘theft
other’); making the extraction of relevant data difficult. What’s more,
disentangling metal thefts from other crime types can be tricky. Simply put, metal theft refers to incidents
where the guiding motivation for theft relates to the material from which an
item is made, not its form or function.
So, for example, a (metal) bicycle stolen for transportation purposes
does not count as metal theft going by this definition.

TRENDS: Metal theft is one of the fastest
growing crime types internationally. This is noteworthy because most
industrialised countries have witnessed general reductions in acquisitive crime
over the last decade. Precise estimates on the extent of metal theft nationally
are difficult to obtain because of the absence of a designated metal theft
crime category. The British Home Office estimate that there were around 100,000
police recorded metal thefts in 2010/11. According to British Transport Police
recorded crime data, the levels of copper cable theft have increased rapidly
from 2005/06 to 2010/11.

CAUSAL FACTORS: Significant
increases in the price of many metals - mainly attributed to a global
supply-demand imbalance - are recognised as the main contributor to the surge
in metal thefts. This is supported by research analysing the relationship
between copper price and copper cable theft from the British Railway Network
(see Figure 1 and the resources page for the paper by Sidebottom and colleagues
which this is taken from). Together with the wide availability of metals, it is
argued that price increases have generated greater opportunities for offenders
to sell stolen metals at financially rewarding prices at a low risk of detection.

HARMS: The harms associated with metal
theft are considerable, both to national infrastructure (i.e. thefts from
telecom and utility companies) and national heritage (i.e. thefts from and
damage to historic buildings). In 2010/11 the theft of railway cabling is
estimated to have caused disruption to over 35,000 rail services and £16
million in replacement costs. Just a few metres of severed railway cable can
generate massive disruption to the railway network. The cutting of power lines
or utility cables also carries significant risks of injuries and deaths to the
metal thieves.

Analysis

Research and analysis of metal theft
has found the following general trends:

PLACE: Metals are ever-present in
contemporary society, meaning that opportunities for metal theft are
widespread. Places that appear particularly vulnerable to metal theft are
railway networks, abandoned housing and churches and graveyards. These
concentration patterns are attributed to a lack of guardianship at such
locations.

Research in the U.S. shows that metal
theft tends to be higher in cities with a greater number of scrap metal yards
per 100,000 residents. Given the finding that offenders often prefer stealing
items that they can sell quickly and easily, it is plausible that an easily accessible,
specialised market for metals might act as an incentive to steal.

OFFENDER: Metal thieves can be organised into
two broad groups: those that steal metal-bearing items (thieves) and those
involved in the trade in stolen metals (scrap metal buyers). The former is
comprised of three types of offender:

The
opportunist. These offenders may not purposefully seek out metals to steal but
will exploit easy opportunities where adequate guardianship is lacking.

Organised
groups. These offenders tend to steal large quantities of metals and have good
knowledge of the scrap metal industry.

Drug
addicts. It is commonly stated that drug addicts steal metals to feed their
habit. These offenders likely steal small amounts of metal that can easily be
sold for profit.

Scrap metal buyers play
a key role in the metal theft problem. They are responsible for converting
stolen metals into cash (or in some cases drugs), thus providing a financially
rewarding incentive to steal. Scrap metal buyers may be intermediate fences or
scrap metal merchants. What’s more, they may purchase stolen metals knowingly
or unknowingly. Finally, ‘insiders’ familiar with or working in metal-rich
industries might populate either offender group, through stealing metals
themselves or colluding with other offenders on the location of - or means to
steal - metals.

TARGET: Metal theft can take many forms.
Common targets include beer kegs, manhole covers, catalytic converters, air
conditioning units, copper wiring and cabling, lead from roofs and bronze plaques
and statues. Variation in the types of metal theft in an area might reflect
variations in the number of opportunities available for different metals and/or
the ease with which they can be stolen, as well broader fluctuations in the
price of different metals.

Active metals – such as ‘live’ power cabling – tend to generate greater
damage than the theft of inactive metals – such as copper piping from abandoned
homes. A common difficultly experienced by police forces and the scrap metal
industry is distinguishing legitimate from stolen metals. Many metals bear
little, if any, unique features to determine their source and/or owner.

Implementing responses

The recent surge in metal thefts has
prompted the implementation of several prevention schemes. In the UK this been
alongside repeated calls for changes to relevant legislation, particularly
updating the Scrap Metal Dealers Act 1964 to help thwart metal thieves and
increase the transparency of the scrap metal industry. Presently, reliable
evidence on the effectiveness of preventive measures is limited. Robust
evaluations to complement anecdotal reports are required. An important
requirement of any evaluation of metal theft prevention activities is to
demonstrate that any changes in the levels of theft cannot be explained by
simple changes in the price of metals.

Efforts to reduce
metal theft have tended to focus on two areas: 1) making it harder to steal metals
and 2) making it riskier or less rewarding to sell stolen metals.These are expanded on below:

Across several crime types, evidence
demonstrates that increasing the effort required to steal an item can lead to
reductions in the levels of theft. Various target hardening schemes have
therefore been implemented to reduce the ease with which metals can be stolen.
These include the implementation of security measures, such as the chaining of
manhole covers or the caging of air conditioning units. It can also refer to
changes in practice to remove available targets, such as not leaving copper
piping at building sites or copper cabling alongside railway lines. In addition,
measures have been put in place to increase the security at places where metals
are commonly found. Removing gaps in perimeter fences near railway lines and
controlling access to utility companies or construction sites are common
examples.

Property
marking: Many groups
affected by metal theft now use invisible forensic technology to tag their
metals. The rationale is that ‘tagged’ metals will be easier to identify as
stolen – overcoming the target anonymity problem – and therefore increasing the
risks associated with disposing of stolen metals. It can also be used as an
intelligence gathering tool to track where stolen metals tend to sold.
Anecdotal accounts report some success following the implementation of such
schemes. However, success is dependent
on incentivising scrap metal buyers to routinely test whether metals are ‘tagged’
and to refuse purchasing those that are.

Disrupting the
market: Selling stolen metals for profit is recognised as the primary
motivation of metal thieves. Scrap metal yards and pawn shops provide a
specialised ready market. It follows that intervening in such markets in ways
that impede the sale of stolen metals while having little effect on the trade
of legitimate metals should lead to reductions in the problem. A common
disruption technique has been to encourage scrap metal merchants to request
that all their customers provide personal details (such as a photographic ID)
when selling metals. Initial evidence from a police operation in the North East
of England – Operation Tornado – indicates that this strategy is effective in
reducing the levels of metal theft in the targeted areas. Success however is dependent
on identifying the scrap metal buyers in the area and forging effective
relationships to ensure high levels of participation in and adherence to such a
scheme.